When I dream of water, I never dream of rain. That
insistent monsoon music has no place in
the soul of this siren – no,
only a sea blanketed by clouds,
or the fog of a morning seeping like secrets between
evergreens and swirling amid the twirling arms
of wind turbines – or the impatience of rivers, hustling
like businessmen or soldiers, confined within the
Earth’s fences, soil slowly yielding to the force of another nature,
another mother, whose sharp tongue froths and whips,
bearing new fruit from old loins – or,
cakes of ice, glassy and heavy and melting loudly,
bobbing like birds among the warmer waters of choppy seas.
Yes, it always returns to the seas.

Rain – that moody, weeping thing, gleaming like a veil
over a sky too full for words – or turning night streets to mirrors,
reflecting in its selfless way the lights of a species
hunched against its gifts, chilled through from wet—
I’ve never seen you quite right,
and I’ve never dreamt of rain falling into oceans,
only in the backyards of my memories, but
I suppose even the ocean must drink somehow,
and even rain must be welcome somewhere.

We walked into each other
Like the sea touching the sky–
Full of hopeful purpose
Without ever asking why.
We were lovely then and braver
Than we thought ourselves to be,
With the wind behind us beckoning
Us toward a soft and simple sea.
It wasn’t that we somehow stopped,
Or ever once awoke
And saw our lives a dismal thing
And the sea a vat of smoke;
But rather that we both pressed on
Though clouds heaved storms and rain,
Refusing to see the hardened lines
Ground deep into our veins.
We swore our oaths like sailors who,
Upon encountered gales,
Bark out their words to steel the sea
And make winds fit to sails.
But there never fonder captains were
Than we two once had been,
As, struggling toward horizons yet,
We succumbed to the ocean.

I hold a heart of water
In the caverns of my chest,
Whose beating waves keep lapping;
Who never stops to rest.
Its coolness tells a story of
Both depth and bitter pain;
Of sinking into passions that
One heart cannot maintain.
This heart I hold is far too wet
To stand all on its own,
But far too changeful, regrettably,
To be another’s home.
It moves in tides and shimmers still,
A lovely siren’s heart,
That sings through night tides wistfully,
“Oh, let us never part.”
But in the morning it is plain
This heart is now too shallow,
For love cannot find purchase here;
The pools are all too fallow.
The lover, disappointed, leaves,
Feeling restless and betrayed,
Impatient for a calmer heart,
Whose songs are quieter played.

But this heart of water bears the pain
Of each unfettered guest
And each new song sings more deeply
Of regret than all the rest.
So if you find yourself adrift
In this heart’s stormy seas,
Merely listen to the songs of love
And do not fear the breeze.

Is there a creature left on earth
Unafraid of falling–
Of the violence of shaken ground,
Of time suddenly stalling–
Do fish flung back to sea
Feel relief or feel afraid?
Are they sorry then to cease the
Soaring flight that they had made?
Can they mourn the loss of flying
Though it ended in a fall,
Or do they swim away instead
And never fear at all?

For I’ve been flung, myself,
Into abysses I have known,
And never been the happier
For once more falling home.